The James Prendergast Library in Jamestown
JAMESTOWN – The James Prendergast Library will be expanding its hours in the coming weeks. On Thursday afternoon the library board of directors approved a plan that would add ten additional hours of operation onto the library’s weekly schedule, and, according to library director Linda Mielke, will come at no additional cost to staff.
Beginning April 2, the library will open at 9 a.m. Monday through Saturday and stay open until 8:30 p.m. It will also stay open until 5 p.m. on Saturday. Currently, the library was opening at 10 a.m. most days and closing earlier on Wednesdays.
Board President Tom Price said he’s happy the board could reverse the change in hours of operations that first went into effect back in 2005.
“Right now its tough to remember which days the library is open,” Price said. “I’ve shown up myself at times because I forgot its not open until 10 a.m. or it closed at 5 p.m., so clearly it will help address circulation issues and getting people in the library. The library is community center and not just a place where people get books, so this makes for a very happy occasion. And this is to the credit of Linda [Mielke], who dug in to the reasoning behind [the reduction in hours] and it turned out it wasn’t necessarily a financial issue. It was other matters that came into play.”
According to Mielke, a plan is also in place to open the library on Sundays from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. That part of the plan will not go into effect until a later date, after the library can make proper adjustments to help offset the cost of making the transition to re-opening on Sundays.
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